Wade Goodwyn

Wade Goodwyn is an NPR National Desk Correspondent covering Texas and the surrounding states.

Reporting for NPR since 1991, Goodwyn has covered a wide range of issues, including politics, economics, Texas's vibrant music industry, tornado disasters in Oklahoma, and breaking news. Based out of Dallas, Goodwyn has been placed in the center of coverage on the killing of five police officers in Dallas in 2016, as well as the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, and hurricanes in nearby states.

Even though he is a journalist, Goodwyn really considers himself a storyteller. He grew up in a Southern tradition of telling good stories, and he thinks radio is a perfect medium for it. After college, he first worked as a political organizer in New York, but frequently listening to WNYC led him to wanting a job as an NPR reporter.

Now, listeners recognize Goodwyn's compelling writing just as much as his voice. Goodwyn is known for his deep, "Texas timbre" and colorful, descriptive phrases in the stories he files for NPR.

Goodwyn is a graduate of the University of Texas with a degree in history. He lives in Dallas with his wife and daughters.

The state of Texas is turning down billions of federal dollars that would have paid for health care coverage for 1.5 million poor Texans.

By refusing to participate in Medicaid expansion, which is part of the Affordable Care Act, the state will leave on the table an estimated $100 billion over the next decade.

Texas' share of the cost would have been just 7 percent of the total, but for Gov. Rick Perry and the state's Republican-dominated Legislature, even $1 in the name of "Obamacare" was a dollar too much.

In Moore, for the many people whose homes were destroyed, the top priorities are finding a place to stay, some clothes to wear, and food to eat. NPR's Wade Goodwyn has been talking with survivors in Moore, and he sent this story.

The National Rifle Association is holding its annual convention in Houston this weekend. More than 70,000 people are expected to attend for speeches and demos and acres of guns, ammo and camo.

The NRA is coming off of a major victory: the defeat of gun control legislation in the Senate. While the talk in the convention hall is about keeping up the fight and staying true to the Constitution, a small protest against gun violence is being held outside.

Nearly 10,000 mourners gathered yesterday to honor the men who died fighting a fire in a fertilizer plant in Texas. They packed the basketball arena on the campus of Baylor University in Waco. At least 14 people died when that fire led to an explosion in the little town of West - which is just north of Waco.

With the house-to-house search over and the living and dead largely accounted for, the town of West, Texas, began the transition from shock and disbelief to communal grieving.

On Friday night, mourners gathered at St. Mary Church of the Assumption to remember the dead. Many of the dead were first responders who were fighting a roaring fire for 30 minutes before the explosion, which was felt 80 miles away in Fort Worth.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn caused a stir when he suggested that there might be many more people missing than thought.

Like almost everything in the Texas, the construction industry in the Lone Star State is big. One in every 13 workers here is employed in the state's $54 billion-per-year construction industry.

Homebuilding and commercial construction may be an economic driver for the state, but it's also an industry riddled with hazards. Years of illegal immigration have pushed wages down, and accidents and wage fraud are common. Of the nearly 1 million workers laboring in construction here, approximately half are undocumented.